Oh, I more or less just finished Blue Mars, but had to take my time getting through it all. But I've enjoyed it! Now I just started reading The Ministry for the Future :)
Some parts of the mars series are definitely a slog, I feel like that's almost inevitable with books that change to the perspective of different characters a lot. Some characters just aren't as interesting as others or they suck as a person and I don't really care about what they think. But so far in this series I've liked the ideas that have developed and I think the setting is really interesting.
Yeah, agreed. Blue Mars unfortunately had a little more of that the I remember from the other two. But the overall world building is impressive and interesting, and I don't regret reading any of it.
It is fitting that it has received a Hugo award, as Les Miserable by Victor Hugo definitely fits into the same category - he could waffle on about very uninteresting things for pages on end before returning to the interesting parts of the story.
Lol I haven't read any of Victor Hugo so I wouldn't know, but it's at least been good practice for speeding up my reading by looking at what's actually important. Kim Stanley Robinson does a phenomenal job of recounting geography (areography) and routes that I unfortunately have no point of reference for, but they honestly matter very little beyond "this is in the north, this is in the middle, this is in the south".
What a bizarre coincidence; that's exactly what I came on to post!
Finished Red Mars a few weeks ago, started Green Mars a couple of days ago. I'd never read any Kim Stanley Robinson before, and I'm enjoying it so far.
Any other recommendations from your award-winners reading list?